Now, I see a problem in this line of thinking: It's easier for men to say I'm ugly than for women. The men are going to rake in all the money. Look at me! I'm so ugly! Imagine presenting that to a jury! Or do you think women have an advantage because they can appear in court without makeup and hairstyling?

If it's a jury of one's peers, then it becomes an ugly contest. When screening for jurors they'll ask, "Are you ugly?" And only the really ugly people will say yes, because kinda-ugly people are usually delusional. Then at trial the ugly jurors will think, "Wow, she's rather pretty. She couldn't possibly know my pain. My pain, as an ugly. We find the plaintiff not ugly."

From the article: "A more radical solution may be needed: why not offer legal protections to the ugly, as we do with racial, ethnic and religious minorities, women and handicapped individuals?"

Would it ever once come across a liberal's mind that maybe we need to look at why we offer legal protections to so many "types" of individuals? Perhaps leading to the shocking conclusion that we have too many.

What would really be interesting is to have someone do an in-depth study of "extreme makeover" reality show contestants and see how their lives have shaped up in years since the show aired. It's been almost ten years for some of the first, hasn't it?

The leftlings have bastardized the English lanquage in their attempt to establish NewSpeak as the official language of the known universe. Political correctness and campus speech codes are already here, and laws against "offensive speech", another "crime" like "sexual harassment" defined solely by the victim, are on the way.

We can no longer even use the terms, "short", "fat" and "ugly" - now it's "vertically impaired", "gravitationally challenged", and "aesthetically underwhelming" or the lawsuits start flying.

So why do you bring this up, Ann? You must be a heightist, and a weightist and a looksist, or something.

Are we separating obese from ugly? I think that this is an important distinction to make.If the source of your ugliness is obesity, I'd be less inclined to sympathy than if it were some elephant-man type ugliness.

Most people are pretty well aware of where they rank on the continuum from ugly to beautiful.

A funny story comes to mind, and true, too: In the 80s I worked at a hotel in Queens and we had several groups who met in our banquet rooms regularly (monthly, bi-monthly, etc.). One of the groups was "Parents Without Partners," a social group where single parents could mix and mingle with the opposite sex and perhaps make love connections. One evening they were streaming in through the lobby, and our switchboard operator, a smart but crusty old New York broad quipped, "'Parents Without Partners'? 'Dogs Without Leashes' is more like it!"

I'm sure my telling can't convey the humorous impact, but it was a killer line, delivered perfectly, and I still laugh when recalling it.

I heard a story that Abraham Lincoln was once stopped by a man walking down the street. "Mister" the man said to Abe, "Prepare to meet your maker.""Why's that?" Lincoln asked."Mister I once said if I ever saw a man uglier than I was, I'd kill 'im on the spot.""Well, mister" says Lincoln. "Go ahead and kill me. If I'm uglier than you are I don't want to live."

I used to have a retail job as a youngster. The first customer service manager was...lets just say she looked like the stereotype of a lesbian (not porn lesbian, but women's studies lesbian). She hired others who looked like her.

Later she was replaced by a younger guy who primarily hired cute younger girls with nice.....okay, I'll say it...boobs.

The German word for ugly is hässlich, which derives from the concept "hate-arousing."

The glorification of beauty and hate met head-on in the mid-20th century Albania. Enver Hoxha, post-war communist leader of Albania, created a "Cult of the Ugly." Link. Money quote:

'The beautiful was also condemned in our country, condemned as a foreign influence,' he said. 'This gave birth to the cult of the ugly. Body odor was glorified, while the scent of fragrances was condemned.'

It sounds to me like Hamermesh is either joking or else stoking some sort of resentment.

Mary, and on the older side to that.....I have worked with or otherwise known somewhat older women who are trying way to hard to look young. The longer stringy bleached hair. The clothes that are too young for them (and what's with the giant purses). The super trendy sunglasses.

I don't see how that is attractive over someone who just dress and looks nice, but not over the top.

Make up for women, was developed solely for women who stay in the house. They can't go camping. They can't go out and do outdoor stuff. Too bad. Eventually, you'll be seen after a rain storm, and then, what?

Maybe we need more protected classes, so that everyone can be one all by themselves.

Wasn't there something in some really important Supreme Court decision about the uniqueness of individual point of view, or some such? Found in a penumbra or an emanation or one of those really important parts of the Constitution?

Well, everyone can look at my picture, and tell that I'm not that good looking. Doesn't matter to me. Once I get those penis enlargment pills that I ordered over the internet, then, it's like look out!

Imagine the police state it would take to suppress the natural preference for beauty and revulsion spurred by ugliness! Nothing less than total immersion and indoctrination in the New Dispensation would be required. Children would have to be ripped from their parents and given to the state almost at birth, for their own good of course. Lefties are creaming themselves at the prospect.

One can make oneself ugly by application of a suitable tattoo. The Japanese method of tattoo (One exemplar with that was Admiral Halsey, who got it done before WWII) extended to the face should do nicely.

Wouldn't forcing ugly people to self-identify discriminate against those who, through no fault of their own, lack the ability to admit how ugly they are? And forcing them to do so would surely traumatize them.

So clearly the classification must be mandatory and done via an independent board.

And those who change - e.g. by exercising to look better, or by changing the way they dress, or just by getting old - would also need a mandatory reclassification and it could not be voluntary either for the same reasons as above, so really, we need to constantly review everyone, cuz we wanna be fair, right? Maybe a govt dept could be formed.

Short-term but important fluctuations in appearance, such as bad hair days, could be compensated for via CCTV and image recognition; that part's easy!

But the classification board itself would need to be mighty diverse cuz, well, let's be honest, some people go for a certain "type", don't they?, and that'd have to be balanced out across many sorts of raters.

And what to do about the feminists who say that beauty is just a social construct? Surely they'll oppose this, right? Cuz if perception of beauty has any innate components, then maybe other traits do too and we know that could never be so.

Actually, ugly fat people are discriminated against regardless of skin color, but I have been unable to find even a loony tune liberal who will take up our cause. Perhaps that is because we are not in the minority.

Actually Ms. Althouse I should extend my comments to the extent that you may be right in terms of the aging of the sexes. My Dad always said that men age like fine bourbon, but women age like milk. So there's that.

For men anyway, I don't think being ugly is an overwhelming disadvantage. When I was younger, I would have cheerfully agreed to a few hairy warts on my face, if, in exchange, I were given a corresponding increase in athletic ability. Ugliness might even be an advantage. Most of us exist in the blah, bland range of normality. True ugliness is a kind of distinction, a way of standing out from the crowd. Charles Laughton is far more memorable than Franchot Tone. Of the many disadvantages a man can have, I would put ugliness pretty far down on the list.